


Two Birds

by amyfortuna



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Fix-It, Gen, Triple Drabble
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-16
Updated: 2016-10-16
Packaged: 2018-08-22 18:38:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8296003
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amyfortuna/pseuds/amyfortuna
Summary: What was the fate of Eluréd and Elurín?





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [StarSpray](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarSpray/gifts).



They said that Melian could transform into a bird at will, that her daughter disguised herself as a bat, that her great-granddaughter was turned into a seagull by the Lord of Waters. 

Her great-grandsons, however, were taken into the forest and there left to starve during the Sack of Doriath. But Celegorm's cruel servants did not know the land as well as the two boys, who had spent their summers roaming the woods until they knew every tree and stone. Though it was winter and the new-fallen snow lay thick on the ground, the boys kept their bearings, and headed toward the nearest source of water. 

From their earliest days, they remembered the light of Lúthien's face, and as she wove songs over their cradles, she gave them powerful messages, spells to protect them. Their long silver hair, like their mother Nimloth's, cloaked them warmly against the night and the cold. Their mother had given them another gift before sending them into hiding: packages of lembas, enough to keep them for a long while. These they ate as they sought for a water source. 

Frozen over though it was, Eluréd and Elurín at last spotted the edges of a tiny stream flowing down from the Mountains of Terror into the forest of Neldoreth. Even after the Girdle failed, ill things did not come into Doriath from those mountains. 

They bent to drink the cold, refreshing waters, and sent their prayer to the Lady of the Seas, Uinen, whose hair is spread out amidst all waters under the sky. She heard them, and granted them bird-shapes. 

Two grey herons stood there among the woods of Doriath then, two small sets of clothing abandoned. As one, they took wing, passing from that place of fear and horror, leaving Middle-earth, never to return.


End file.
